Birangana (Liberation War Heroine) Rama Chowdhury has breathed her last while undergoing treatment at Chittagong Medical College Hospital (CMCH) early Monday. She was 77.
Rama’s only living son Jahar Lal Chowdhury told the Bangla Tribune that her mother passed at 4:10am on Monday.
"My mother has been undergoing treatment at the CMCH since January 17 for different old-age complications including diabetes, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and hypertension," said Jahar, adding that she was put on life support at 11:30pm on Sunday when her condition deteriorated.
"Her body will be taken to Chittagong Central Shaheed Minar at 10:30am on Monday where it will lie in state. Later, she will be buried at her birthplace at Boalkhali upazila in Chittagong," said her son.
Born in 1941, Rama, obtained her MA in Bengali literature from University of Dhaka in 1961 and is the author of 19 books. She lost her husband and two children in the Liberation War of 1971. On May 13, 1971, Pakistani occupational army brutally tortured and violated her as well as torching her house at Popadia in Boalkhali upazila of Chittagong. Out of grief and respect for freedom fighters, Roma started walking barefooted from 1972. Though she momentarily stopped walking barefooted for health condition, she resumed the practice on December 16, 1998 when her youngest son was killed in a road accident and never stopped the practice afterwards.
A pall of gloom and grief descended on the freedom fighters, politicians, cultural activists and her well-wishers and admirers soon after the news of her death spread.